An Unfurled Star
by Lady StarFlower
Summary: The fortune teller is young, unlike the usual wizened crone you see trying to cheat mindless blokes in shady red light alleys. From the moment he saw the spear-pole on the wall, the scars on her bare stomach, and the EXILE tattoo on her shoulder, Bakugou knew he was dealing with a wild card. But, then again, he was always a suitor of danger. Space Opera AU Bakugou/Uraraka.
1. Like Meets Like

The rumors painted the fabled fortune teller as a rabid infidel in her nineties, but the girl sitting in front of him is svelte, lush and young, her deep chocolate eyes drowning his soul like a sandpit.

The incense is already muddying his thoughts, but he focuses hard on the woman in front of him. The fortune teller is young, unlike the usual wizened crone you see trying to cheat mindless blokes in shady red light alleys. Her motions as she pours some rosewater tea are deft and sure. From the moment he saw the spear-pole on the wall, the scars on her bare stomach, and the EXILE tattoo on her shoulder, Bakugou knew he was dealing with a wild card.

But, then again, he was always a suitor of danger.

"So." The fortune teller's drawl is colored with a smile, and he shifts uncomfortably on the plush cushion beneath his knees as her round fingernails tap on the lacquered table between them. "What brings you to my prison? Seeking immortality? Immunity?"

Her smile widens at his stony silence. "Love problems, then?" She chirps, much to his horror. "I have potions that can erase sterility and incite passion in all species of living kind."

Kirishima snickers loudly beside him but is as grave as a politician the moment Bakugou swivels to glare at him.

"I'm not here for that shit." His voice is sharp when he looks back, and the fortune teller smiles, a flash of dangerous teeth. "Well, then, you're of the clientele that wants me to use my eyes to find your target, _bounty hunter_."

"You know us?" Kirishima blurts, and Bakugou barks at him. "Oi!"

The fortune teller giggles, her tight cunning relaxing to banter. "Everyone in this quadrant of the galaxy knows that insignia on your shoulder, Ground Zero. I don't need my Sight to figure that out."

For a banished fortune teller, she's quite good. "Then you should know why I'm here." Bakugou leans forward, slapping a silver-edged card on the table. "That's at least five thousand credits, lady. Now. Where is Midoriya Izuku?"

The fortune teller's eyes flash. Her hands, creeping for the money, freeze in their motions. "The great thief?" Her voice shivers the slightest bit, though if it was from fear, anger, or curiosity he couldn't tell. "You chase after a ghost."

"Ghost stories don't scare me, girl." He snaps his fingers and Kirishima hands him the tablet, the screen already glowing with the nerd's deer-in-the-headlights face. "If you had half the skills the rumors gave you, then you could be my greatest asset in finding this criminal and bringing him to justice."

The fortune teller takes the tablet from him and studies Midoriya's face. "It _is_ him." Her murmur is so soft that Bakugou nearly misses it.

She looks up at him, incredulous. "You want me to locate a man who commands the greatest spacecraft in the galaxy?"

"He's a sniveling fraud aboard a stolen ship!" Bakugou bites out the words. Even after all this time the words taste bitter on his tongue. "He filched the best spacecraft in the goddamn _world_ from All Might himself and dares to imitate the late hero's legacy. I _need_ to bring him to justice."

She cocks her head to the side. The jewels entwined in her hair clatter harmoniously together. "You, bring him to justice? A bounty hunter who only sees the numbers over a wanted man's head?"

Bakugou grits his teeth. He can't tell her, he can't tell her that he shared a childhood with this nerd, went to academy together, learned to pilot together, earned their goddamned stars together. They were going to be Captains of the Galactic Fleet, sworn protectors of the galaxy for gods' sake! But Deku had to fuck it all up when he stole the fastest ship in the galaxy, _One For All_ , away from the Admiral and made off with it in the dark of night.

It hurt him. It _enraged_ him.

He'll change things. He'll bring that goddamned nerd back to the Galactic Fleet even if it means going dark himself.

His hairs prickle on the back of his neck and Bakugou realizes that the fortune teller is watching him. When he glares up at her, he notices with a start that her dark swampy eyes are wide with understanding. _Fuck. She knows._ The rumors are true.

His hands clench around the delicate beading covering the table. "Look, are you gonna help me or not? If not you're just wasting my time."

The fortune teller leans back, the incense wafting around them in swirling eddies, making Kirishima cough. "I will help you." She snatches the silver card from off the table and pockets it deep in her floaty sleeve. "But you'll need to take me aboard your ship as a navigator."

"What? You're an exile!" Bakugou barks. "Plus, I've already got a navigator, and he's damned good at it!"

"Aw, shucks, Boss!" Kirishima beams, and doesn't even bother to dial the grin down at Bakugou's ferocious expression.

"Your skills must be unparalleled to be aboard Ground Zero's ship, but even you don't have the Sight." The fortune teller says kindly. "You won't be able to sense every thought that goes through Midoriya's head, every coordinate that his men input onto his console. And if I can do that, then the Fleet won't find me breaking my exile."

She rises determinedly from her seat, and as her bare torso comes into view, he's shocked at how much of it is muscle. Isn't she supposed to be just a helpless old granny? "I'm coming with you."

Bakugou clicks his tongue. "The spacefields are no place for a little fortune teller. Can you defend yourself?"

The fortune teller smirks, and in one whirling motion, smooth as a wingbeat, she's got one end of the spear-pole from the wall braced on the table, flinging herself forward to leap clear over their heads and onto the verandah behind them.

She leans easily on the spear pole, grinning wide at Kirishima's slack-jawed expression and Bakugou's faint curse of astonishment.

"Of course, I can do more than aerobics." The fortune teller singsongs casually. "I can disarm any humanoid as long as they've got less than three arms, though I once fought a four-armed tentacle man from the Templar Region and only got minimally scarred in the process." She taps her forehead. "Seeing into the future, even for a few seconds, really helps with combat, I've learned."

"Dammmmmmn." Kirishima whistles, and Bakugou almost echoes his navigator's awed expression. Out loud, he only says gruffly, "Alright, fine. I'll let you on my ship and pay you, lady, if you can take me to Midoriya within seven cycles."

The fortune teller smiles. "On one condition, oh great Captain."

She sticks out her hand, utterly unafraid of the wrathful glower on his face. Though it's perfumed, he sees the toughened skin of callouses dotting her palm. "Don't call me lady. I'm Uraraka Ochako."


	2. Out Of Silver Clutches

The ship is a beauty. Passed down from his mother, she has wings like the curve of the moon's crescent, a sleek nose like a needlepoint, and triple engines that growl, purr, and roar at an easing of a lever. Heavy gun barrels hang off its sides, menacing in their size. Painted a dark grey accented by orange trimmings, the ship blends into the blackness of the stars with the stealth of a panther.

Uraraka's eyes take in the beauty of the ship, and she smiles with fondness. Bakugou is about to bristle to an argument at her lack of a compliment but realizes that she must've seen the _Black Explosion_ from his mind's eye, seeing as she gazes upon it with the same joy that he feels when he comes aboard after a successful heist.

"You can bunk with Mina." Kirishima is rattling off eagerly to Uraraka, his contagious energy and enthusiasm affecting the shape of her smile. "She's kinda our engineer, though Sero is the real whiz at mechanics. She's mostly our weapons specialist, and Kaminari is our monitoring man. He's real good at electronics and the such…"

Uraraka laughs, and her eyes flash unearthly. "They sound lovely. I can't wait to meet them!"

 _That freaky Sight's gonna take some getting used to._ Bakugou thinks to himself, stiffly yanking out his comm. "Oi, Raccoon Eyes, we're back. Get the doors open."

The ship's ramp unlatches with a familiar hiss, and a pink flailing of limbs erupts from the steam. Mina all but falls out of the ship in her urgency. "Captain! Captain! The Galactic Fleet just…oh!" She skids to a stop, blinking at the slight figure smiling back at her. "You must be…"

"The fortune teller. Uraraka Ochako." Uraraka waves, her other hand clutching her bundle of things. For such a renowned fortune teller, she only has a small satchel of possessions to her name. "Nice to meet you!"

"Introductions later." Bakugou growls, his boots clattering onto the ramp way imperiously. "What about the Galactic Fleet?"

"They just sent out a broadcast to all four galaxies." Mina hands him a tablet as Kirishima closes the ramp behind them. Uraraka tiptoes to peer at the screen as well. "The Galactic Fleet just sent out two of their best captains to track and bring back Midoriya. There's even a whopping price on his head now."

"Damn, look at all those zeros." Kirishima mutters. "They must really want to bring Midoriya to justice."

Bakugou swears under his breath. He knows these two captains. Everyone in the academy knows that split of red and white hair, those cold eyes that so closely mirror his father's. And the girl's…that giant ponytail can't actually fit in a space helmet, can it?

"Todoroki Shouto and Yaoyorozu Momo." Uraraka reads off the screen. "Oh yes, the Rising Duo. Prodigies, I've heard. Graduated top of their class and have been putting away stars ever since."

 _I had more stars than them._ Bakugou's head screamed. _I could've gotten more if Midoriya hadn't gotten his sorry ass expelled._

Uraraka looks up, her eyes wide, and the bounty hunter curses under his breath. _It's not the Sight she's got, it's freaky supersonic hearing_.

"Let's get off this planet." He says sharply, shoving the insecurities into some faraway corner of his mind. "Head for…." Bakugou turns to her. "Where should we go, Uraraka?"

She perks up, shaking away the supernatural muddiness in her eyes. "Um…" She glances at Kirishima. "Do you have a map you can pull up?"

"Sure! Lemme show you!" Kirishima beckons her over to a monitor as Bakugou's foot taps impatiently. "See, this panel is mostly for navigation. This screen's for the map, and these buttons can manipulate it at will. Here…" His first mate's fingers fly over the controls, and within seconds a huge diagram flickers into view.

Uraraka takes in the blinking meteorites, the round planets, jagged coastlines, intergalactic border stations and more with only a perfunctory sweep of her gaze. Bakugou frowns at the almost bored-air she emanates as the fortune teller carefully selects a quadrant and enlarges it. Shouldn't a stranded fortune teller be utterly helpless when it comes to things like this?

"Our two prodigies will be trying to discreet, so let's avoid the usual shady cantinas." Uraraka finds the toolbar and drags giant red X's over Y-14 Zone, X'thollor, and Ares Ground. "Midoriya will be avoiding them as well. We'll have to travel along either the government mandated starways or planet jump along as many 'haunted' planets as possible."

"Haunted….like ghosts?" Mina asks. "Is the Galactic Fleet superstitious?"

Uraraka shrugs. "Haunted is used by the fearful, but the Galactic Fleet would rather use the word 'irradiated'." She glances back at Bakugou, whose patience is fraying by the minute. "Isn't that right, cadet?"

His heart jumps into his throat. Kirishima casts him a worried glance.

When he speaks again, his timbre in his voice is crackling with rage. "If you don't find me a destination in three seconds I'm going to call the nearest Galactic Station and turn you in."

Uraraka's eyes are muddy with the Sight again. "You won't do that." She turns to the monitor and taps a bright blue planet, swamped with green. "The water planet Rana. There is your best choice."

"Will Midoriya be there?" He demands to know.

The fortune teller looks away, and for a moment her shoulders draw together, as if in pain. "Yes. Let's hurry. He'll try to leave before the two suns cross."

Bakugou smiles, a deadly grin that shows off all his teeth. "That's the stuff that'll have you raking in silver, girl." He barks at Kirishima, "Set a course for Rana, and be quick about it!"

"How many engines, sir?" Kirishima asks dutifully, and Bakugou snarls with savage joy.

"Use all three."

He thinks he hears Uraraka sigh.

O.O

It isn't long before the little fortune teller's got the crew practically wrapped around her delicate fuckin' finger.

She perches on the spiraling stairs that lead to the pilot's bridge, kicking her bare feet and watching the crew busy themselves with the equipment below. She calls to Kirishima every now and then to guide or correct their course, her eyes muddying with the Sight as her voice echoes with an eerie reverb.

Bakugou walks tentatively around her. No being should posses this sort of power, supernatural or not.

 _My boy, we make our own fate_ , his mother would say as she guides his hands to the controls. _No one's ever going to strap us down_.

And yet, here is a girl who can see fate unspooling in front of her like an unraveling carpet.

 _It aint' natural. She's like a sticky stardust_ , Bakugou thinks irritably as Uraraka reads Mina's palm for the umpteenth time with no more than a laugh, _the kind that clings to the cockpit and never comes off, and you can't see through it for shit._

But she does cheer the crew up. And Bakugou knows how much they need cheer these days, with their mug shots being broadcasted to every sentient planet every single cycle with the words CRIMINAL and WANTED blared out beneath them.

They need the levity she exudes as easily as breathing.

"How far can you see into the future, Uraraka?" Even Kirishima is rapid-firing questions at her with a fanboyish curiosity.

The fortune teller rubs her bare neck, bashfully. Though it's cold on the ship with the heating systems going through maintenance, she's still wearing those gauzy scarves of hers. "Hah, I can see at least a few years ahead…but it just gets murkier from there. It really depends on each person…"

"Can you see your own future?" Sero pipes, hanging upside down from the piping in the ceiling like some grinning spider suspended on ironweave webs.

"No, I can't."

Kaminari bursts in like an adrenaline-fueled rocket, clutching a tablet open to a dating site, "Is it true that you can predict a person's love life?!"

Uraraka outright laughs, but suddenly her voice cracks brittle and her eyes turn muddy and he wonders why she's turning white as a sheet-

" _They're here_."

Bakugou is already leaping for the stairs when he sees the reflection of silvery blue of Galactic colors flashing behind them in a whirl of portal-exit residual dust. Kaminari only has enough time to shriek "SHOTS INCOMING!" before a massive explosion rocks the whole ship violently.

Bakugou nearly falls off the bridge and bellows to his crew, gripping the bent railing, "GET TO YOUR ACTION STATIONS YOU BLITHERING IDIOTS!"

"Ooh! Ooh!" Mina all but slides down the floor in her eagerness. "Boss, can I man the guns this time? I wanna test out the rotators!"

"Fine!" Bakugou's yanking on a pair of dark safety glasses as the space around the ship turns an ominous shade of frizzly white. "But if the guns jam I'll throw you out the ship!"

"Aye aye, Captain!" Mina scrambles back up, her delighted squeal trailing off as she tucks herself into the cockpit upstairs.

The ship's frame suddenly gives out a frightening _CRUNCH_ as the metal buckles inward, and from the floor Kirishima lets out a yelp as pipes burst above him with a hiss of white steam. "Goddammit, they're using that new inverting tech!"

"Those filthy rich Blues…" Sero complains as he sets about frantically taping the dents and dings in the _Black Explosion_ 's infrastructure with ironweave. "We gotta dodge those cannons quickly, sir."

Uraraka stands poised on the bridge, her eyes murky dark. As Bakugou slides into the pilot's seat, flicking switches and punching buttons, she speaks.

"Ground Zero." Her voice is stern, and echoing with Sight. "In a few seconds, follow my instructions _exactly_."

Bakugou smirks uneasily as he grips the acceleration lever and plants his feet on the brakes. "This better work, Uraraka."

The intercom speakers crackle harshly, and Kaminari lets out a startled noise as the communications systems is overridden. Galactic blue lights sweep across the previous rainbow of colors on the consoles, and a cool voice speaks over the hacked system. "Criminals, stand down. If you resist you will be fired upon. This is Galactic Fleet Captain Todoroki speaking, I repeat, stand down."

Bakugou snarls. Dimly he hears Mina calling to him for permission to fire.

"Wait." He growls. "Wait for Uraraka's signal."

The fortune teller's knuckles are white as they grip the railing. She stares into the spacious beyond, her eyes swirling with a thousand possibilities, her teeth gritted, and then suddenly-!

She screams, "BRAKE!"

Bakugou slams his feet down on the brake pedals with a yell, and the _Black Explosion_ snaps to a stop, lurching backwards as a sudden beam of concentrated light from the left skims the nose of the ship.

Another ship, a silver-sleek Galactic spacecraft, rises out of the smoke and dust like a blade from the dark. Even from this distance, he can see a woman in captain's colors standing on the pilot's bridge, hands on her hips and a dark ponytail swirling around her head.

" _God fuckin' dammit_." Bakugou says eloquently.

"This is Captain Yaoyorozu." Her silk-in-steel voice joins the crackling satisfaction of Todoroki's feed on their hacked systems, cool with triumph. "You are surrounded, criminals. I advise that you come with us quietly."

Sweat beads on his neck. _We can't outmaneuver two Galactic ships at once._

A small hand touches his shoulder epaulets, making him jump in his seat. Above him, Uraraka speaks. "Ground Zero?" Her calm soothes his frazzled nerves.

Uraraka clears her throat, shifting nervously on her feet. "I need to cover your eyes, okay?" Reaching around him, she spreads her fingers over his eyes, and he stiffens.

"H-Hey!" He sputters, reaching up blindly to try to tear off her fingers, squinting between the cracks, "I can't fuckin' see! Are you trying to crash us?!"

"This is going to feel really weird, sorry." Uraraka breathes beside his ear, and before Bakugou could make a retort his world blanks, muddying-

 _Bank left. Sharply._

His hands jerk the levers left, and the _Black Explosion_ rolls neatly to the side. Mina's shrieking somewhere above him and Kaminari is cursing the hackers with every foul word he knows, but all Bakugou can do is react to the visions in his head, flooding through him like water-

 _Caught off guard, Yaoyorozu will try to swing her ship around to keep facing us. There will be an opening to her right_.

His hand finds the acceleration lever and snaps it forward. All three of _Black Explosion_ 's engines flare with a roar of sound and for a millisecond the ship crouches…and then pounces. The tip of Black Explosion's left wing skims narrowly by Yaoyorozu's ship, and a smattering of sparks fly up from where the metal rips against metal. Then the screeching cuts off, and there is blissful silence.

 _We will escape._

"What the-?" Todoroki's voice snaps, only to be cut off with an abrupt crash of static, and Kirishima pops up from behind the consoles, proudly holding a cut and sparking wire in his fist. "Can't hack a dead system!" He says with fierce triumph to a horrified Kaminari.

 _But we will be pursued._

The flash of Galactic blue lights blinks angrily behind them, and Bakugou reels backwards in his seat with a harsh gasp as Uraraka lets go of his face.

"Okay, you need to floor it, Bakugou." She says, panting. "I will trust your piloting skills from here."

"We've got bogies behind us, Boss!" Sero calls as he unwinds from the ceiling. "And judging from their charging cannons, they're pretty pissed!"

His fingers fly across the control panel. The ship responds to him like a great cat curling around its master's legs, purring fit to burst.

This cat wants to play.

Bakugou flicks switches, eases his seat backward. "Get yourself strapped in." He barks at Uraraka, who is shaking off traces of Sight. "It's going to get bumpy."

And as the ship races forward, cheering through space awash with blue, he laughs.

For this is his element.


	3. Acceleration

The Galactic ships, for all their technology and pilots' genius, fail to catch up to the slippery _Black Explosion_. They dwindle and fade behind the ship, glittering like wrathful silver stars on a silhouetted horizon before disappearing completely.

The crew goes to sleep for the night cycle, bringing their noise and energy with them and leaving nothing but the comforting purring of the ship to keep him company. He lets the ship rest, only using the one engine up top to carry them ever forward.

Uraraka perches next to him on the railing of the pilot's bridge, her brown eyes blurring and coming into focus at intervals as she watches the future.

After a while, she blinks, and then glances down at him.

"You should sleep, Captain." Her voice is her own; untouched by Sight, it's sweet. "We'll be fine for a few hours, and I can keep an eye on the ship for you."

"Tch. I'd rather not." Bakugou shoots back. "You don't know a thing about flying spacecraft, much less this one. I don't want to wake up an ice cube in space."

Pouting, Uraraka folds her arms over her chest. She's still wearing her fortune teller rags, thin and filmy. He wonders if she's cold. "You can teach me!"

Bakugou snorts. "It took Kirishima a year before he mastered piloting, and most of the ship's dents came from him crashing into meteors. Sero was the same, though it only took him 11 months instead of a full year. And Kaminari and Mina have been banned from even climbing the pilot's bridge."

Uraraka giggles. "That bad?"

Bakugou nods. "That bad."

The fortune teller slides off the railing lithely and practically dances over to him. Her bare feet make little noise on the metal walkway. "Just a few basics?"

"Do you see an ass-kicking in your future?" Bakugou growls.

"I can't see my own future, I've told you that." Uraraka has her arms crossed, her arms veined with lean meat. "Now are you going to stop being a pompous ass or will you try teaching me how to fly?"

The rage that seethes off of him makes her smirk, but he stands, easing his hands off the levers. The ship responds to his absent touch like an abandoned infant, twitching erratically as it blindly searches for the guiding hand of its pilot. Uraraka clutches the panel for support.

"Both hands on the wheel." Bakugou snaps, kicking the pilot's chair towards her. "And sit down. Brakes are operated by your feet."

Uraraka promptly sits down, and she slides down in the chair to feel for the brakes with her feet. Bakugou cackles softly when he realizes that her bare toes are just barely touching the brake pads.

The girl's sliding down even further in the pilot's seat with a determined look on her face before Bakugou grabs her collar and lifts her unceremoniously out of the chair. "Hey! What was that for?"

"You're too fuckin' tiny." He informs her roughly, but it comes out breathy with a hint of a chuckle. "I'll work the brakes, and you just hold the accelerators, got it?"

Uraraka squints at him before her smile takes on a mischievous slant. "…Are you asking me to sit in your lap, Captain?"

Bakugou feels the hot flush of blood soak his face for a moment before he forcefully wills it to cool, thankfully leaving naught but a raised eyebrow in return. "I don't see you refusing, Cheeks."

It's the fortune teller's turn to blush, and something about the way her breath catches makes his insides tingle, like he has touched an open socket.

"Besides," He rambles on, feeling the blush sink lower and disguising the sensation by lightly kicking the brakes, the ship slowing at his command, "Someone's gotta keep us from flying off into who-knows-where when you get overexcited."

Uraraka smiles a bit at that, and she moves to him, tentatively. After a moment of deliberation, she perches proprietarily on his knees, her soft wispy garb fluttering around his thighs. When he doesn't speak for a moment, almost afraid to move because of the new weight on his legs, Uraraka twists to glance at him.

"Are you going to teach me or not?" Her voice is lilting, teasing. Bakugou thinks he likes it, and then bats the sugary feeling aside. He doesn't need that shit in his life.

"Don't get cocky, girl." Bakugou scoots the pilot's chair forward closer to the controls. Her hands reach out to wrap around the accelerators, and Uraraka breathes in sharply as all three engines simmer under her touch.

"I can teach you how to outrun a battleship or how to navigate a meteor debris field in less than thirty seconds," His rough mutter ghosts over her ear and she shivers, "I can teach you the workings of the ship and where every single fuckin' pipe and screw that fits inside this spacecraft goes…I can teach you how the ship responds to _me_."

His hands adjust her hold on the controls and Uraraka shifts on his knees carefully. "But how the ship will respond to _you_ I can't teach. So you need to pay attention, got it?"

Her voice is determined when she replies. "Understood. I'll do my best."

And when the ship surges forward under the dual touch of bounty hunter and fortune teller, the soft smell of her clean hair tickling his nose, Bakugou grudgingly ponders the idea of prolonging her stay.

 _After all,_ he thinks as the _Black Explosion_ bounds forward with fierce joy, _the ship seems to like her_.

O.O

After a few hours of quiet cruising, Uraraka begins nodding off, and so he unceremoniously dumps her off his lap. She falls with a yelp on her rear and winces irritably, rubbing her backside. "That hurt, you know."

"Then you should stop dozing like an old lady." He snaps back, drawing the chair closer to the controls. "Especially when you're flying other people on the ship."

Uraraka hangs her head a little, but she looks back up quickly, her eyes big as a doe's and filled with penitence. "I'm sorry. I'll do better next time."

His eyes find hers in the reflection of the glass. "Who says there'll be a next time?"

Uraraka shrugs, her eyes twinkling. "I suppose I have my Sight to thank for that."

Bakugou grunts and turns back to the panel. "Your power's freaky."

" _You're_ freaky." She retorts with the grace and maturity of a child.

Bakugou looks at her pink cheeks and her pouting moue and thinks about this strange girl, this unnatural woman who looks through a shroud of unmasked secrecy on a daily basis and yet hasn't gone mad with the craze of clairvoyance. He has heard tales of sorceresses, of witches who saw too far and too deep and brought their own end upon them.

And though Uraraka is not unaffected; he's noticed the way she stares into the middle distance sometimes, her eyes cloudy with some farseeing shroud, she lives with cheer and with calm.

Maybe it all revolves around the fact that she can't see her own future. Perhaps that is a roadblock she should be thankful for.

"Um…"

Does he want to know his future, his fate? Will he ever clear his name, and catch Deku and bring justice and peace to All Might's shattered legacy? Will he stop seeing zeros above the heads of both the deserving and the undeserving? The silver that lay in his lock box was smelted from the same ore that gripped the wrists of his captives.

"Ummm…Bakugou?"

She could do it. Gods know that she has already proven her worth time and time again. He could always ask. The knowledge of the path before him was in the hand of the girl with the murky eyes, and perhaps he could tread his life better if he knows…

"BAKUGOU!"

Uraraka's shriek snaps Bakugou out of his reverie and with a sudden jolt of panic the bounty hunter sees alarms flashing all across his console, red with danger and searing into his eyes a blinking warning:

FUEL RESERVES LOW. REPLENISH IMMEDIATELY.

"Shit." Bakugou spits, his head whirling. Where is the nearest planet? He had been so hellbent on tracking a path to Rana, the planet as green as Deku's fuckin' deer eyes, that he hadn't considered the toll the journey would take on his ship.

The triad of engines sputter, coughing as the _Black Explosion_ shivers, the smooth hum of the machinery grating rough. He can hear his crew, jerking awake with sleepy alarm as their bunks rattle beneath them.

"Goddammit, this is what happens when you let a rookie burn gas." Bakugou mutters, turning off the third and biggest engine uptop. He raps the monitor irritably. "Why isn't the fuckin' map working?"

"Try heading west of the second sun." Uraraka pipes up beside him, her voice thoughtful and mellifluous. "There's a small red planet that should be within reach of your ship's reserves."

"A small…red…" Bakugou stiffens. "Are you suggesting we refuel at Gur?"

"Is that what it's called?" The fortune teller tilts her head to one side. "I've seen its red dust in a lot of my clients' minds. Red dust, black metal, smoky lamps, clay cities…"

"Yeah yeah I fuckin' get it." Bakugou turns the accelerators to the left, his teeth digging into his lip. "The planet of battle arenas, black markets, and alleyway murders. It's neutral territory, so nobody really has jurisdiction over the place, so the only government the planet has is crime."

"I think I got some lovely gecko marrow from their market system." Uraraka says thoughtfully. "I had to send them a lot of AB blood though. That was slightly disconcerting."

"Shut up, let me concentrate." Bakugou snaps, ignoring the way she harrumphs at him. He eases the acceleration levers forward, wincing at the screeching protest of the drying gas tanks. "This won't take long, just a moonless cycle and we should be on our way."

Uraraka looks down at the bounty hunter captain with a frown. Her eyes cloud, and she sees green, electric and determined.

Her hands clench.

She forces a smile in her reply. "Of course, Captain. We should not take long, not at all."


	4. Red and Green

He hates Gur the moment they land. Red dust swirls and cakes on the windows and engines, killing whatever energy was left inside the ship. Scavengers pop up from the ground like insects and scurry greedily towards them as the landing platform gets stuck in a mound of red earth.

"Lay one greasy finger on my ship and I'm skinning you alive!" Bakugou barks at them, coughing as the red dust stings his eyes and settles in his hair. The scavengers make very rude gestures at him and promptly burrow back into the ground, chittering angrily.

"It's desert land we've stepped into, Boss." Kirishima hands him clothes in a dull red and goggles for his eyes. "We gotta dress appropriately."

Bakugou clicks his tongue with annoyance as he looks out at the sprawling red dunes, honeycombed with flat clay houses and angry black towers spiraling jaggedly into the orange sky. Harsh neon signs blare the latest victors from the planet's famous battle arenas in vivid colors.

"Get a set of clothes for the fortune teller." He snaps, jerking a thumb to where Uraraka is peeking curiously out the ship. "I need her for a few errands."

Kirishima raises an eyebrow but nods and vanishes back inside, gesturing Uraraka to follow him. The fortune teller trots after him, looking back at Bakugou with something unreadable in her gaze.

When she emerges, tugging on her goggles, he has to stifle back a snort of laughter. The clothes practically blow in the wind; her shoulders drown in the too-big collar, and only the tips of her fingers can be seen from underneath the sleeves.

Uraraka frowns as she pulls at the belt around her waist, tightening till they can see the true shape of her trim waist. "Isn't this a bit big for me?"

Kirishima pops his head out again, something sly under the business-like innocence on his face. "Oh, those are the Captain's. The others are still torn up from an incident with an acid machine."

Bakugou chokes and Uraraka steadily turns redder than the ground she's standing on. Mina props up a hand on her hips, not so much smiling as leering. "I guess we make do with what we have, eh, Boss?"

"Whatever." Bakugou mutters, slinging his rifle over his back. "Don't get that suit messed up, got it, Cheeks?"

"Mmmm." Uraraka manages to reply, her hands flitting uncertainly over the material. She resorts to gripping her spear-pole for purchase, following Bakugou as he stomps off in the direction of the city.

Bakugou shouts over his shoulder to his crew. "If we're not back by sundown, find us. Watch the ship till then, got it you punks?"

"Hey! Why do we hafta stay behind?!" Kaminari yells at the retreating back of his Captain. Sero yanks him back inside swiftly as Kirishima just sends Bakugou a beaming smile and a hearty thumbs up.

"We'll be waiting!"

O.O

Gur's skies are often clouded red and gray. It's considered a clear day when they're are tinted a light orange, dusted by black fluffs of smoggy clouds peppered with steam ships puttering along the skies peddling their wares.

Today, the winds are rough, and anyone with organic faces in a fleshly body have their heads ducked down, wincing as the red sand whips at their faces and bites at their exposed skin. The dangers are often in front of you and at your feet, not thousands of miles above your head.

So no one notices the silver bubble that hums down from the bellies of sleek blue ships high in the atmosphere, rough with rust and sputtering from faulty valves. The hunched-over couple inside look emancipated, sick; their faces are lined with years and their hair is white with age.

Scavengers poke around their ship in disgust before spitting on it, cackling in dissatisfaction as they whip away into the sand. The couple glance around them, before hobbling towards the city, their bandaged feet hobbling with startling speed.

For no amount of face paint could hide the flickering rage of a Galactic Commander who has been wronged.

O.O

The crowd stinks of sweat, spices, and the metallic taint of blood.

Uraraka staggers as the Sight crashes into her like a monsoon wave on an ocean planet, wincing as hundreds of babbling voices sweep through her head with dizzying force.

...paying back my father's debt…

I love her, don't you understand?!

Going to make that son of a bitch pay double the price…

…my dear, these aren't just any clavicles…

…Mother, am I doing wrong?

…he's going to use the scarves for tomorrow's match, the fool…

Kacchan?

She gasps and nearly falls backwards, a viselike grip on her wrist jerking her back on her feet.

"Oi, don't get all spacy on me, you idiot." Bakugou's harsh voice cuts through the haze clouding her eyes, and she blinks quickly to see Ground Zero glaring at her through his goggles, the steady red flicker in his eyes burning with impatience even through the steamed glass.

"We're here to get supplies, not sightsee and wind up getting our organs donated to some creepy cult." He flings her wrist back and stomps forward, the crowd pushing her forward to walk with the swell.

Uraraka yelps as another flash of green sparks past her Sight and she leaps forward, grabbing Bakugou's sleeve. He staggers backwards and nearly crashes into a litter carrying some perfumed lady. "What the actual fuck!"

"H-Hey, we should go this way." She points hurriedly to the left, where the sounds of determined emerald lightning are faintest. "I think we can get some good things here."

Bakugou glances into the sooty street. Uraraka is willing to bet that his eyebrows are lifting underneath the tight cloth of the red uniform. "…That's a brothel."

She shrieks, turning crimson. "There's a mechanic's shop besides that, pervert!"

His pupils shrink to slits. "I'm not being the pervert, you shithead!"

"Do you want engine fuel or not?!"

"Not if they're going to sell me lube for gas!"

"Listen, you're overthinking things." Uraraka grabs Bakugou's wrist in her hand and firmly begins marching towards the brothel and/or mechanic's shop, practically towing the seething bounty hunter after her. Someone tries to wolf whistle the two, but it ends in an embarrassed squeak when Bakugou turns blazing eyes upon the general direction of the culprit.

In her flustered haste, Uraraka nearly collides with a girl lounging in the doorway of the unidentified shop's entrance. She turns a slightly too-wide grin towards them. She's smudged with black grease, sweaty from the heat of the forge, and wearing a very small wife beater that leaves very little to the imagination.

The girl looks them up and down with a salacious slowness that would make a nun blush. Uraraka briefly wonders how she is able to see anything past the thick baggy red of their jumpsuits, but apparently the girl likes what she sees because she looks them in the eye and grins. "Hey there. How may I service y'all today?"

"See?" Uraraka smiles. "It's a mechanic's shop!"

"Judging by how violated I feel, it's definitely a brothel." Bakugou mutters.

Uraraka pinches him and turns back to the amused-looking girl as he hisses audibly. "Hi, we're looking for engine fuel, enough to fill a Tier V's tanks to full."

"It's a Tier VI, idiot." Bakugou grunts.

The girl cackles, her whirring goggles honing in on them like a microscope over bacteria. "There's only four Tier VI ships in the galaxy, and only one o' them isn't government owned. You expect me to stow that kind of gas here?"

Bakugou yanks off his hood, his sweaty blonde hair sticking haphazardly to his forehead. "We have the dough, so cut the bullshit before I blast those goggles off your head."

The mechanic tsk's. "If I don't have it, I don't have it. I'm waiting on my dealer to get me a new shipment, but he won't be around for a few cycles yet. You folks in a hurry?"

Uraraka's head throbs. Something green and gold crosses her vision, and suddenly her heart stops. "You had enough fuel reserves for a whole armada of Tier VI ships." Her fists tighten, and beside her she can feel Bakugou stiffening at her sudden rage. "Who did you just sell to?"

The mechanic shrugs carelessly. "Does it matter who I sell to?" She flicks her goggles up, revealing shrewd yellow eyes that dance with some inner madness. "I did think it was odd, having another Tier VI ship owner step into my shop, but then again, today has been an odd day for me."

Uraraka's mouth goes dry. Green freckles, green hair, green lightning flashes behind her eyes, and she nearly topples backwards in her haste. "We need to leave. Now."

Bakugou is staring death daggers at the mechanic, who is now whistling and fiddling with tools in her belt. "What the fuck did you mean, another Tier VI ship owner?" His voice is deadly soft, more terrifying than any of his loudest shouts.

The mechanic looks up, her smile turning wicked. "What else would I mean?" She counts on her dirty fingers. "One. The first Teir VI ship was built some thirteen years ago, run by the intrepid All Might. The other two were constructed especially for Galactic purposes.

"And the fourth…" She looks Bakugou straight in the eye. "Constructed by a famous bounty huntress, destroyed by marauders, and then salvaged and remade by her son, Ground Zero. Take a guess on who just left my shop a mere half hour ago."

Uraraka feels ice in her veins, her heart beating painfully. The green she had seen…

Bakugou whirls on her. "You saw." His eyes are furious, two orbs of red that drowns out his pupils. Something hot burns in his gaze, and it isn't all rage. It's hurt, and it comes through in his voice. "And you didn't tell me."

Uraraka opens her mouth, and helplessly shuts it. "I couldn't tell you." Her whisper is defeated. How can she explain it to him? "I'm…I had…"

"I gave you silver." He stalks towards her, forcing her backwards until her back hits the wall by the mechanic's doorway. "You piloted my ship." His hands twitch towards the heavy gun on his back. "I trusted you."

Uraraka tries for a firm response, but her voice refuses to cooperate, and all that comes out is a soft, "I couldn't."

"COULDN'T WHAT?"

He nearly knocks her aside in his fury, in his angry path towards the door. "WHAT COULDN'T YOU DO, HUH? WHAT ENIGMATIC BULLSHIT IS STOPPING YOU THIS TIME?"

The mechanic whistles lowly, but she doesn't stop the rage from pooling in Uraraka's belly and she jerks forward, knocking their foreheads together in her helpless fury. "I LOVED HIM, ALRGHT?!"

Silence falls in the workshop. Outside the crowd continues to bustle, the forge in the shop still burns, but Bakugou has stilled, staring at her in chilly silence.

"I loved him." She whispers. "I loved Midoriya Izuku."

Bakugou leans back, slowly, as if he had just seen something repulsive uncoil before his eyes. His eyes are red, so red, nothing like the calming verdant green of the past.

The floodgates have opened. She continues to babble on, her eyes stinging madly. "I loved him so much I got myself exiled for him. I loved him so much I broke a vow and looked into his future. It was full of green, of stardust, and of you, following him like a plague. But I wasn't in his future."

Grief, as sharp as it was years ago, sinks its bitter fingers into her heart like talons. "I loved him." She laughs a little, a painful little sound. "After everything I did for him, I thought something could happen. But one look with my Sight and everything was dashed to the floor. I wasn't in his future; not as a wife, or even as a copilot."

Uraraka feels wet warmth on her cheeks, and swipes angrily at it. "So I left him. I couldn't bear it, being by his side while seeing nothing but stars in his path. And…I don't know, I thought the years had dulled me. But…one look at his face on your tablet and I wanted to run after him again."

Bakugou's face contorts, and something harsh crosses his expression. "The famous exiled fortune teller and the runaway traitor…" His laugh is cruel and sharp, like serrated blades digging into flesh. "Why is this so fucking ridiculous?"

"You're the one who is ridiculous." Her color is high, her voice pitched to match. "You're the one who wants to chase him around the galaxy over a goddamn grudge-"

Before she can blink, his hands has slammed into the reddened wood next to her head, and it practically splinters. "SHUT UP!"

"Kacchan!"

They both freeze. It can't be. No, she would've seen, the Sight would've told her-

Midoriya is standing in the doorway, his eyes just as wide and green as she had remembered. Something is off about the way he holds himself, the way his eyes keep darting back and forth as he fidgets, but it's the same face she has been dreaming of for the past five years-

Bakugou whips around faster than she would've thought possible, his fist closing around the single pair of handcuffs that has always been clipped to his belt, hidden under layers of red uniform. Midoriya lets out a startled yell as Bakugou leaps towards him like a rabid animal, snarling with horrible ferocity as the mechanic lets herself out with a great hurry.

"Hatsume!" Midoriya yells frantically over Bakugou's screams, "No, don't, they've got the-!"

"All of you, stand down."

Uraraka jolts in defensive instinct as a strong arm curls around her neck and covers her mouth almost soothingly. She twists violently, but the low voice that speaks by her ear makes her still in slowly dawning horror.

"The famous turncoat Bakugou Katsuki, self-styled Ground Zero." Captain Todoroki casually twists her arms behind her back as she stumbles to her knees, watching in dismay as Captain Yaoyorozu steps calmly around Bakugou and Midoriya, the two men gasping in unison as something silver sinks into their necks.

Uraraka hears the triumph in Todoroki's voice as the sedative enters her own neck, "The banished exile, Uraraka Ochako, and the Galactic traitor, Midoriya Izuku. Never in my life have I ever bagged a bigger group of wanted Galactic criminals in my life."

"You've done well, Captain." Yaoyorozu's soft voice begins to blur, the induced haze in her veins turning the world silky and dreamlike.

Todoroki's final words have the honor to send her to sleep. "We will receive a fine reward for these three."


	5. Where Dark Dreams Walk

_When you get older, plainer, saner_

 _When you remember all the danger we came from_

 _Burning like embers, falling, tender_

 _Long before the days of no surrender_

 _Years ago and well you know_

 _Smoke 'em if you got 'em_

 _'Cause it's going down_

 _All I ever wanted was you_

 _I'll never get to heaven_

 _'Cause I don't know how_

 _Let's raise a glass or two_

 _To all the things I've lost on you_

 _~LP, Lost on You_

O.O

The fluorescent light makes the fortune teller look like a wild gamine of the slums. Her mussed brown hair shines almost blonde in the chamber, her head tossing slightly as she murmurs in her sleep. Her scars are white, lacing across her stomach like an intricate spider web.

"Even exile can't keep her down for long." Yaoyorozu speaks from behind him, and Todoroki makes an affirmative noise, watching as the white-gloved men move busily around the fortune teller's body.

"My father made it clear that if I had to choose between the three, she was to take top priority." The young captain crosses his arms, his expression sour. "But why would a little clairvoyance make her so much more important than two of the most wanted men in the galaxy?"

Yaoyorozu is quiet, silently watching as the fortune teller cries out a little in her drugged sleep. Even without looking at her, he can feel her unease. "…Something about this whole thing worries me."

"It's clear from the start what they were up to." Todoroki moves away from the glass and begins making his way out of the recuperation wing, her shiny black boots following just behind him. "Bakugou Katsuki obviously recruited her in hopes of tracking down Midoriya Izuku. Something drove them apart, and we caught them in their rift. We could not have had better timing."

"That's what worries me." Yaoyorozu casts her gaze out her window, where her own ship sails calmly alongside Todoroki's. Even from here, they can see her co-pilot Jirou marching about on the deck, her hands behind her back, watching the ship in her commander's absence. "Isn't this all a little too perfect?"

His steps still. "What do you mean?"

"It could all be coincidence, I know that." Yaoyorozu says slowly. "But do you remember what Midoriya was doing when we found him?"

Todoroki casts his thoughts back. "He was talking to every engineer he could find on the streets, asking if they had someone come in and ask for Tier VI engine fuel."

"Exactly." Yaoyorozu nods. "He was looking for them, Todoroki. And if that doesn't bode trouble, I don't know what will."

O.O

Under the oceanic pull of drugs, Bakugou dreams.

He thinks he's asleep, sitting in the worn seat of the _Black Explosion_. Old pilots with callused palms call it dream space; moments when you're flying a ship through an endless swathe of stars and the constant white and black of the stars shooting by fizzle into static. Your eyes droop, hypnotized, and you fall into a trance close to sleep and yet far from rest.

The place where the darkest dreams walk.

He dreams of walking through polished steel halls, of flashing red alarms and the wailing warnings of the dock bay opening with a tremendous groaning of metal on metal. He dreams of young polished boys, wearing the Galactic blue with eyes full of stars.

He dreams of a huge booming laugh, of piercing blue eyes brighter than the most refined of laser light. Great muscles strain at the Admiral's uniform and he hears a deep and thunderous voice, calling, "Young cadets, you too can become like me."

And the admiral's bridge goes up in green lightning, and Bakugou's screaming, his throat rubbed raw as he sees Midoriya and Uraraka standing in each other's arms on the railings, watching him fall with blank eyes…muddy eyes…

Bakugou jolts up with a hoarse yell. His shout bounces off unnaturally the curved wall of his room, taunting him with its echo.

"What the fuck…?"

Smooth round walls the color of milk encase him on all four sides. There's a slit of a window by the ceiling, revealing endless miles of starlit darkness. Bakugou groans, slinging his arm across his eyes.

"God fucking damn it all to hell."

"You've got quite a tongue on you, kid." The voice is bored, muffled, and distinctly annoyed. "Your mother give it to you?"

His arm slides off his face. "Who the hell are you?"

The voice on the other side doesn't reply, but Bakugou thinks he hears a sigh. "They were right about the space fields. They do wear away at a man's mind."

Bakugou tch's loudly. "I ain't got time for this. I need to break outta here and get back to my crew."

"This is a Galactic ship, Bakugou." The voice sounds exasperated, and beginning to sound more and more familiar by the moment. "It would take a Galactic mind to break out of these sort of quarters." The voice chuckles. "And you gave that up long ago."

"Alright, who the fuck do you think you are?!" Bakugou snaps, leaping to his feet as if he'd fight the wall itself. His already frayed mind can't take more bullshit today, for gods' sake!

"If there weren't a barrier between us I could've strangled you already, Bakugou Katsuki." The voice has turned cross, and suddenly Bakugou's arms are dropping by his sides, as if on half-remembered reflex. He stares in stunned disbelief at the wall.

"Captain Aizawa?"

"Ex-captain, actually." The voice, for all its gruffness, sounds resigned. "The night Toshi- I mean, Admiral All Might disappeared from the Fleet, I gave up my stars to look for him. I left before all the drama between you and the problem child went down, but I got the general gist of what happened."

Bakugou growls. He slides to a sitting position on the floor, his eyes drawn into a mutinous line. "Lemme guess, teach. You gonna give the whole pep talk of 'You shouldn't have been so rash' and 'Midoriya chose his own path' and all that shit?" He scoffs. "Don't bother. I hated it when the officers said that and I would hate it even more if it came from you."

From the other side of the wall, Aizawa makes a noise that sounds disturbingly like a chuckle. "The Fleet needs more of that rash impulsiveness, if you ask me. Things went downhill the night you blew up half the headquarters."

"That asshole Todoroki became Admiral, right?" Bakugou grunts. "I saw the reports."

Aizawa sounds terse when he replies. "Yes. The Galactic Fleet became a thing of iron after he took charge. I was glad that I left. You should be, too."

Bakugou opens his mouth to snap, but memories of a sentient scarf and a terrifying glare that left recipients rooted to the spot causes him to reluctantly dial down his reply. "I left for a completely different reason and you know that, teach."

"Hm." To his ears, Bakugou's former commanding officer sounds vaguely disapproving in his reply. "You were going to bring our problem child to so-called justice, right?"

"I have a-"

"I'm not criticizing your motives, Bakugou." Aizawa interrupts. "I understand that you felt the 'betrayal' of Midoriya more keenly than others. I'm just saying that there are more important things to worry about at the moment."

Bakugou bristles angrily. "Like what?"

Aizawa is silent for a moment before he replies in such a low voice Bakugou has to lean in to hear him. "Like why the best Admiral in the galaxy disappeared so suddenly with no explanation."

O.O

There's a red door in front of her.

She reaches out her hand and grips the handle. It growls beneath her touch, like the purr of engines waiting for her command. It feels like hot breath on her ear, a throaty whisper, two crimson eyes glittering in the dark.

Uraraka shudders and draws back her hand as if the handle had burned her.

She doesn't dare to look.

There are so many doors here, in this space that isn't quite death and isn't quite life. They all have beautiful golden handles, waiting for her to unlock their many secrets, like chocolates in gold foil from rich planets.

But she's already opened one. And that one scarred her too deeply to try again.

"Aw, don't tell me you're _scared_."

There she is again. Perched on top of the green door, swinging her stockinged feet merrily as her mad eyes follow her every movement.

Uraraka balls up her fists. "Get out of my head." Her voice echoes in this dream space. "I don't want you here!"

"Oh, cute Ochako!" Toga giggles. "You can't say that after everything we've been through!"

Uraraka stomps over to the green door. Her footsteps echo on the mirror-bright floor. "You lied to me."

Toga pouts, her lips scrunching up. "Hey, Ochako, what are you talking about? I told you that looking into our darling Izuku's future would answer your questions! I didn't lie at all!"

"You said he was going to be with me!" Uraraka shouts. "You made me look! It's your fault!"

Toga kicks her feet. "It was _your_ decision to look, cute Ochako. I just suggested it. No biggie!"

Uraraka stops in front of the green door. It doesn't growl like the red door; it crackles. "Just because you have the Sight like me doesn't mean you can just waltz into my head and do what you like!"

Toga blinks, her eyes widening sweetly. "I'm just checking up on my sister in the Sight. It's for your own good, Ochako! You're going to go crazy if you try to do this by yourself!"

Uraraka feels her fingernails digging into the soft of her palms. She doesn't realize how heavily she's sucking in breath, how the pseudo world around her has begun to spin slowly around her until she's falling backwards, the endless row of doors warping like some twisted magician's nightmare.

Toga looks down at her, her sharp teeth glinting in the glow of dream space. Her coo is lost in Uraraka's terrified sobs. "…But it seems like you're already well on your way there, cute little Ochako."

O.O

 _SUBJECT 526-A: Uraraka Ochako_

 _CURRENT STATUS: Comatose, stressed_

 _DAILY PROGRESS REPORT: Subject shows signs of intense cerebral activity, especially in the frontal lobe. Subject's amygdala is severely agitated, increasing blood pressure and heart rate. Recommend a higher dose of barbiturates._

 _NOTES: Under close inspection, the subject's eyes underneath the lids has turned a bright yellow color. Requesting senior instruction as to how to proceed._

O.O

Far away, on a black planet with red skies, two men stand on a cliff.

"You can feel her, can't you?" The faceless one chuckles. "She's really come far."

The emancipated one coughs, but doesn't reply.

"I wonder how those two star pupils of yours will fight over her." The faceless one leers.

The emancipated one looks up, his eyes two orbs of blue fire. "…They won't fight over her."

"You're probably right, Admiral." The faceless one looks west, where the sun is just rising over a cracked horizon. "They'll be _fighting_ her."


End file.
